A lot has happened between my last post and this post. From being focused and totally stressed out about my job, I vary between the occasional gym session, holidays, shopping and city outing weekends, baking weekends, and lately, sewing classes and school!
Yes I have also been very good at falling sick. I am still working on that part. Now, coming back to my post today, I want to start off that we are now past the mid-mark of 2011, and it is around 4 months to me marrying Soenke. Hee.....
It has been a pretty wonderful "birthday week", in the days leading to my birthday tomorrow. On an honest note, I really, truly dread turning 26 years old. To me, it's really downhill from there agewise. Nothing else to look forward to. I even just bought a facial cream that says "From 25, imperfection skin needs a skincare that both treats its imperfections and preserves its youth". Need I say more? The cosmetics industry have a cut off point for women aged 25 years and above!
On the other hand apart from avoiding and silently worrying about turning 25 (26), Soenke brought me to a very nice restaurant for lunch. See it as a trigger that starts off my birthday celebration. I would like to see it that way anyway. A wonderful lunch courtesy of my future "parent-in-laws", Erika and Jörg. THANK YOU! VIELEN, VIELEN DANK FÜR DAS LECKERE MITTAGESSEN UND DIE KARTE! :)
The restaurant is called Les Amis, voted by the Miele Guide 2010/2011 to be the Asia #11 restaurant. I was truly looking forward to go there. We got a bit lost looking for it as it was at a location that we passed by 100 times but never thought that it is there! (Sorry for the highlight, I could not manipulate my font properly to suit the background)
For the first appetizer which is not included in our course meal, it was a very crispy biscuit topped with thin sliced, truffle oil infused ham. The "biscuit" tastes like pizza dough to me, just more brown and a lot more crispier and the ham was aromatic and very salty.
Moving on, we were served with bread. And then followed by our real appetizer. I chose a ciabatta egg, wild mushroom, spinach and Australian truffles. Soenke had a garden salad. Although we shared, I didn't enjoyed the garden salad but I loved every mouthful of my truffle-y spinach with crispy ciabatta slice and poached egg. Oooo....I can have that everyday for dinner.
For mains, I chose pan fried danish halibut on artichoke heart and cheesy risotto. Soenke had a leg of a suckling pig! Oh gosh, I will always remember the waiter bringing out half a suckling pig and asking Soenke which part of the pig he wants to have. I really enjoyed my fish but the cheesy risotto was too much for me.
With a full belly, we waited for our dessert. Rhubarb cream, rhubarb served with elderflower ice cream and dark chocolate was mine and Soenke had a crispy apple with yoghurt ice cream. I love the combination of rhubarb with elderflower ice cream and bits of dark chocolate and also the crispy pastry skin with apple sauce. Soenke thoroughly enjoyed both dessert as well, especially when he got the whole of the rhubarb cream :)
Too full for tea/coffee, we were surprised that we were still served with cakes and cookies for that. This is for me the highlight of the day. The lemon flavored Madeleine was mind-blowing. So simple yet so perfect. WOW. The rest of the platter, chocolate mini cake and nougat was to me negligible. Nonetheless, amazing meal.
For dinner, we had a simple meal of roast chicken and salad with Rui Chin who came and visited!
On Sunday, I made Luftkuchen. Lovely layers and very light cake. Very apprehensive at first. But it turned out to be successful. I just need to work on my food presentation skills. Soenke said it was good and so did my colleagues! Happy happy happy.. (Also, thanks to Erika for giving me the recipe!)
I also received birthday cards from my parents and Soenke's parents. :)
So in half an hour, the dreaded time of turning 26 years old has come. Urgh. Undeniably, it was a great build up of events.
My thanks and gratitude to my parents for bringing me to Earth, kisses and hugs to Soenke for promises of a birthday waffle breakfast and for celebrating the whole week with me, and of course many thanks, appreciation and best wishes to my "parents-in-laws"!
30 mins to go....
